5 Easy Steps To Successful Leadership Development
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| 5 Easy Steps To Successful Leadership Development |
Effective leadership development takes various forms. Larger organizations often have established plans, but this is not necessarily the case for smaller enterprises. Whether you have a formal program before or are beginning from scratch, preparing your company's future leaders does not have to be hard or expensive. In reality, investing in and developing in-house talent is likely to be less costly and time-consuming than acquiring and training new employees.
Additionally, developing existing staff demonstrates that you appreciate them. That's a win for everyone, and it fosters loyalty.
So, where should you start? Here are five practical suggestions to help you build a leadership team.
1. Understand training versus development
When company owners consider training, technical skills are generally the first thing that comes to mind. While they are obviously vital for any position, leadership development extends beyond job-specific training.
For example, your project manager may need to take an Excel course to improve their spreadsheet skills. However, in order to actually advance—as your future director of operations leading a team of project managers—they will need a leadership development plan that addresses both current and long-term objectives. Consider long-term vs one-time.
Successful leaders possess excellent soft skills in addition to technical abilities. At a minimum, you'll want to strengthen your leadership team in the following critical areas:
- Team building
- Communication
- Coaching and visioning
- Conflict resolution
- Negotiating
Hands-on experience is one of the most effective methods to build these leadership abilities, particularly when paired with mentorship, role-playing, reading, and further classroom instruction.
2. Determine skill gaps and future requirements
What talents are in short supply at your company? What areas need additional development to improve your team and organization today and in the future? These are the kinds of questions you'll need to address before implementing any form of leadership development program.
For example, maybe your sales staff needs to improve their ability to present ideas and negotiate contracts. Or maybe you have a marketing manager who is an excellent communicator but needs assistance connecting the dots to become more strategic.
Your training for them should reflect this. Aligning individual leadership development programs with organizational objectives is critical to the success of your company and its present and future leaders.
3. Determine who is most suitable for future leadership
Now that you've identified the knowledge gaps, you should evaluate which individuals and supervisors to nurture to fill them.
First, talk with team members who are already in leadership roles. Take the time to learn about their professional goals. What abilities and experience will they need to function at their best now and in the future?
Next, speak with additional junior workers who indicate leadership potential. That will give you an idea of both groups' interests and potential prospects. Then, you'll be better able to assess what training and on-the-job experience they'll need.
4. Provide essential training
The formal, rigorous approach to leadership development popular in big corporations is not necessarily appropriate for lesser organizations. Most small firms cannot afford to send managers away from the office for days or weeks at a time for training.
Similarly intriguing, neuroscience reveals that individuals recall more of what they learn when it is provided in more frequent, smaller pieces. That suggests that six one-hour courses are likely to be more effective than a single six-hour instruction.
And by all means, think beyond the classroom. Formal schooling is merely one of several ways to build leaders. One-on-one mentorship, experiential learning, on-the-job training, online courses, and stretch projects with coaching are all excellent approaches to building the intellectual, people-focused abilities required of leaders.
5. Have a constant leadership development perspective
The most successful leadership development approach will prioritize developing a culture of continual improvement above a formal program. This encourages your employees to take the initiative via self-directed learning and a knowledge that their training and objectives should be aligned with the demands of the organization.
Technology has developed to enable limitless opportunities for self-directed learning, and cloud-based tools such as Microsoft Teams and SharePoint make knowledge sharing simpler than ever. Whatever method you choose, frame leadership development from the perspective of a marathon, not a sprint.